


The Cruelest Game

by emanthony



Series: The Biggest Change [7]
Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: M/M, Pining, Threesome - M/M/M, blood splattered kisses and bad decisions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-08-12
Packaged: 2020-08-19 13:20:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20210413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emanthony/pseuds/emanthony
Summary: Time healed none of Kurapika’s wounds. He would call it a symptom of trauma. He’d never learned how to let go; he couldn’t. If he let go, he would have nothing but the blood beneath his nails, the hate in his heart, and jars of eyes sitting useless upon his bedroom shelf. The desperate feeling of want was the only thing that kept Kurapika alive. And he wanted Leorio. He always would.--A continuation of the Biggest Change series, featuring Kurapika and Leorio a decade after the Hunter Exam. Almost exactly a decade, because Hisoka is nothing if not a showman.This story also takes place after the events of the Biggest Change series written to this point (parts 1-6). You don't have to read those to read this, but you can, to better understand the context of their world. It'll also make Hisoka and Illumi seem less OOC, since they go from very in-canon to literal soft-hearted murder-husbands over the course of that tale. Also, Gon and Kalluto are a thing. It makes sense if you read the story, I swear.





	The Cruelest Game

It had been nine years and three-hundred-fifty-five days since Hisoka had participated in the Hunter Exam for the second time and met some of his very favorite people in the known world.

It had been one year since favorite person number seven had become a regular ally, friend, and occasional third wheel.

Kurapika visited Hisoka and Illumi’s home in Yorkshin monthly, usually with a specific job he pulled from the Hunter database. He knew the code to the keypad that let him operate the elevator that led to their flat. He knew where the glasses were kept in the kitchen. He had learned how Illumi and Hisoka took their coffee (with poison, sugar, and cream). He had a toothbrush stored in the back of Illumi’s bathroom drawer.

He’d even let Illumi trim his chin-length bob last month.

Hisoka watched, a familiar push of arousal stirring within him despite his recent orgasm, as Kurapika bounced on Illumi’s dick. Illumi sighed, throwing his head back, and his fingers tightened on Kurapika’s tanned thighs. He came, eyes closed, mouth open.

There was something deeply soul-soothingly satisfying about watching Illumi come. Hisoka had seen it thousands of times, that little exhale from between his lips, and it had yet to get old. 

Kurapika finished immediately after, biting back a scream as he always did, blond hair slick to his face in sweat and tears, limbs trembling.

Illumi’s eyes opened, pinning Hisoka at his side. He blinked in question--slowly, just like their pet cat, Kiki. 

Hisoka raised an eyebrow in response and smiled very slowly. 

Kurapika slid out of bed and into the bathroom naked, snapping the door shut behind himself. The sound of rushing water came from behind the wall a moment after.

“Why is he here?” Illumi asked.

“Are you complaining?” Hisoka made it a point to stare at the white splatter of cum across Illumi’s chest.

“I am not, no. I am curious. He was here just last week.”

“I invited him. This wasn’t exactly how I thought we’d start, but I don't mind.”

Illumi’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t respond, but continued to look, black eyes perfectly dull in the dim evening light of Hisoka’s bedroom.

Hisoka wondered if he’d be mad. He hoped, a little, that he would be. It cost quite a bit of money to repair the furniture that broke whenever they fought, but it was an expense well worth it to see Illumi come unhinged. Hisoka was getting hard again. “Will you be upset if we can’t sleep with him anymore?”

Illumi’s face went neutrally blank once more. “That is an unusual question.”

Hisoka leaned over him in bed. His hair, currently a dark silver, was pinned into a high ponytail, the sides of his head shaved clean. He looked down at Illumi, his hair dense and black as ever, and stroked a piece off his round cheek. “We can keep him if you want.”

“I do not care one way or the next. Why are you asking?”

“He might not talk to us again after next week, is all. Did you know we’re ten days away from the tenth anniversary of our Hunter’s Exam?”

Illumi blinked twice and then shrugged. He wasn’t good at nonverbal communication and Hisoka giggled at how robotic a gesture his shrug appeared. 

The shower turned off. Hisoka spun off the bed and popped his back, the sound cracking through the bedroom. Illumi sat up. 

“What do you plan to do?” he asked.

Hisoka slid his hands together and bit his tongue as the hunger welled within him to do something terrible and great and cruel. “I’ve found an apt job for him to do.”

Kurapika emerged, hair wet, pulling down a blue robe over a fitted beige jumpsuit. 

“Feeling better?” Hisoka asked, leaning towards him as he approached.

Kurapika’s death stare rattled many men, but it only thrilled Hisoka instead. He was half-mast already. “Stay away from me,” Kurapika said, exiting the room.

Illumi yawned before pushing himself out of bed. “What is your plan?”

“Do you remember his friend Leorio?”

* * *

Spending time with two soulless bloodsoaked assassins had an effect on Kurapika, though he liked to pretend otherwise. If asked, he would say that it was purely an association of convenience.

They were occasionally helpful during the missions he took on his quest for vengeance. Their home was a useful midpoint in Yorkshin City. The way they used him sexually satisfied and hurt him exactly the way he wanted, the way he deserved.

Convenience, that was all.

But the effect they had outside of those things was undeniable as he stood between two halves of one corpse, soaked entirely, head to toe, in blood. 

It felt good.

It felt good to sink into his rage, into the blackness that had overtaken his heart. It felt good to steal life from those who didn’t deserve it. It was like pressing into a fresh bruise, an ache that he earned through his mistakes.

“Oh good,” rang out Hisoka’s voice from the end of the corridor. “He didn’t kill you.”

Kurapika turned to glare in his direction. “No thanks to you.”

“I was busy. I found his hostage, I think. Do your chains pick locks?”

A lock that Hisoka couldn’t snap? A lock he couldn’t crack? It seemed unlikely. Kurapika stalked towards him. Hisoka gestured to an open door, and inside, blackness. 

“There’s a safe,” Hisoka said. “Someone’s inside.”

Kurapika stepped through, Hisoka on his heels. His eyes adjusted to the dark and he was indeed facing a safe, its large locking mechanism visible on the front. Kurapika looked it over, stroking his chin. “I can probably break in--” He stood up to see Hisoka standing very close; he hadn’t even heard him move. He stared up into Hisoka’s bright yellow eyes and frowned. “Yes?”

Hisoka reached up and wiped a smear of blood from the corner of his mouth. “It’s nothing.”

Kurapika instinctively tilted his head into Hisoka’s touch. He caught himself and started to pull away, but Hisoka leaned in and kissed him before he could. Kurapika thought about hitting him and pushing himself free, but there was something satisfyingly feral about kissing with a face splattered in gore.

He moaned as Hisoka sucked on his lip and chased his tongue. Hisoka lifted him, pinned him to the wall, and Kurapika wrapped his calves around Hisoka’s middle, pressing himself in close. They hadn’t ever had sex without Illumi there, but Kurapika didn’t consider that--he didn’t consider anything beyond Hisoka’s hand closing around his hard dick tenting his pants. Kurapika pulled back to gasp for air as Hisoka pumped him, fabric growing slick with precum. 

Kurapika hissed, shifting himself against Hisoka, eyes squeezed shut. “Stop, stop. It’ll chafe.” As horny as he was, he didn’t want to limp around with a raw cock while they navigated their way out of the warehouse. Hisoka smiled fangedly, sliding his hand inside the front of Kurapika’s suit and down to his erection again, hand to skin.

“Better?”

Kurapika moaned and pulled him into a kiss once more as Hisoka jerked him fast and hard. 

“Do you want me to fuck you too?”

Kurapika shook his head--and then nodded--and shook his head again. It was too much too quickly--Kurapika felt his eyes swell, overstimulated. Hisoka’s other hand slid over his pants, to his ass, fingers sliding into his crack, against his hole through the fabric. 

“I could tear into your suit, if you want,” he said, sharp nails catching on the surface. Kurapika found himself grinding into Hisoka’s hand as he said it, gasping at the thought. “What a picture you make,” Hisoka said, voice airy, unaffected. The sound of it made Kurapika’s dick leap, a spurt of precum jolting through him. “Blood splattered and begging for it. Illumi gets like this sometimes, too. He likes to suck my cock then, though. Do you want to suck me? I could come on your face.”

“N--It’s too--” He choked out, but the words were lost in an aroused cry. “I’m going to come--”

He did, vision whiting out, the pleasure pumping through him in waves.

Hisoka pulled his hand from Kurapika’s suit and started to lick it clean. Kurapika watched him dimly and licked his lips. He pushed away, shoved Hisoka against the wall in his stead, and dropped to his knees. 

He started to work the laces at the top of Hisoka’s elaborate black trousers when he heard the door to the safe squeal open, sliding into the wall at one side. Kurapika tried to leap to his feet, but found himself stuck; rooted in place at Hisoka’s feet, hands stuck against his crotch and thigh.

Before he had a chance to question it, he heard an intake of breath and an intimately familiar voice say, “What the fuck?”

Kurapika tried to leap up again and succeeded this time, nearly toppling over in his haste. He spun to see exactly who he expected.

Leorio.

“Hello, Le~o~rio,” said Hisoka. “I guess I managed to unlock the door after all, didn’t I? Were you the prisoner being kept in here?” He hummed. “I had no clue.”

Kurapika’s shock fissured all the way to his core. He slowly turned, knowing his eyes had gone crimson in this state, and looked at Hisoka with earnest betrayal. After all this time, after all they’d done, Hisoka had turned on him nonetheless. Humiliated him in the plainest sense.

“Oh, Pika, you seem upset. Are you going to kill me?” Hisoka asked.

“While I’m--” Leorio coughed, “Sure you earned it, can we do that after we’re out of this shit hole?” His voice was hoarse, weak. Kurapika turned back to him and felt some part--some weak, pathetic part--break at Leorio’s torn, bloody suit. He rushed forward before he could stop himself. 

“You’re hurt.” It had been two years since they had seen one another. Two years since they were best friends. Two years since Kurapika had confessed his love and been rejected, without question, and had to leave.

Time healed none of Kurapika’s wounds. He would call it a symptom of trauma. He’d never learned how to let go; he couldn’t. If he let go, he would have nothing but the blood beneath his nails, the hate in his heart, and jars of eyes sitting useless upon his bedroom shelf. The desperate feeling of _ want _was the only thing that kept Kurapika alive. And he wanted Leorio. He always would.

But it was certainly a detriment now, years later, as he stared with a broken heart at the man he loved. He had the taste of someone else on his kiss-bruised lips; the feeling of someone else’s hands imprinted on his body; and Leorio knew it. Leorio had seen it.

It was expected that he couldn’t look Kurapika in the face. He coughed again, a spat of blood hitting the air. “I’m dying, but I’ll be fine if we can get the hell out of this place within the next, I dunno, day.” He hissed, wincing as some unknown pain lanced through him. “Or six hours. I give myself six hours.”

Kurapika gently slid an arm around Leorio’s middle and helped him forward. He knew the way out and he marched without question to the exit. 

“Where’s the nearest hospital?” Leorio asked. “Where even are we?”

“A military base in the Artik,” Kurapika said. He shot a look at Hisoka, who marched behind them, hands in his pockets, smiling. Kurapika really did want him dead. 

That would be a truly deserving death. Hisoka, in response, slowly licked the corner of his own mouth. Like a satisfied tiger lapping at its bloody maw.

“How long have I been down there?”

“I don’t know,” Kurapika said. He had a feeling Hisoka knew the answer, but he had an even stronger feeling Hisoka wasn’t there to help him at all. 

“Shit. Talk about a kidnapping. I always figured they’d go after, like, Cheadle, or something. Maybe even you. What have I ever done to anyone? Was there a ransom?”

“No,” Kurapika said. “We didn’t come for you, in fact. Nutri had stolen from a man that put his entire life savings on the line to order a hit.”

“Seriously?” Leorio pressed a hand to his skull. “You’re an assassin now, too?”

“No. He was an affiliate of the Ryodan.”

“Oh.”

Kurapika guessed that was how Hisoka heard of the job. Kurapika guessed that’s how Hisoka arranged this fateful encounter. He should have known better, truly.

They continued down a damp hallway, the smell of mildew and rotten meat permeating the air. After a few minutes of silence, the only sound that of Leorio limping along, Kurapika said, “There are no hospitals here. It’s too remote. But I have my chain.”

Leorio laughed and then immediately sucked air through his teeth in pain. “Between the two of us, I have a marginal survival rate, I guess.”

They made it to the stairs that led outside. Hisoka stepped in front of them, standing on the first stair, head tilted as he watched. Kurapika turned to lift Leorio, bridal-style, and Leorio chuckled, and winced. “You’re a little short to carry me around, you know.”

“Shut up,” Kurapika said. One benefit of their years apart: he’d gotten much stronger. He raised his arms, holding Leorio up like a new wife crossing the threshold of a very fucked-up home, and took a step. 

He made it halfway up the staircase, following behind Hisoka, before Hisoka chimed in: “I could carry him if you want. It’ll be much easier--we’re nearly the same height.”

“If you touch him, you will die,” Kurapika said between gritted teeth, and he truly meant it.

“Scary,” Hisoka replied. At the top of the stairs, he hopped out and into the moonlit snow. The base was abandoned, so there weren’t any operating lights save for the few emergency panels upon each building.

The cold air hit Kurapika’s face as he stepped outside and in the next instant, there was nothing but searing flame. He felt himself shoved backwards, still holding Leorio tightly against himself, as he fell down the stairs, missing all of them entirely as he flew through the air and impacted the ground below.

The resounding boom of the explosion deafened him, blinded him, and the way he landed with a bone-cracking smack against the concrete of the warehouse knocked the wind from his lungs.

His consciousness blinked in and out briefly, but Kurapika came to with ears ringing; blue eyes blinking white shapes from his retinas. Pain began to bloom from his hands and he looked down to see his knuckles had been seared with red burns. 

Around him was a crater where the warehouse bunker used to be. He coughed, soot filling the air. 

Leorio? He called, but he couldn’t hear himself. He reached up and pressed a hand to one ear as it continued to ring. Was he deaf? _ Leorio! _

He could see nothing in the wash of falling black snow and gray smoke.

Hisoka? _ Hisoka? _

He pushed to his feet, coughed again, and dropped the chain he used to heal. He slid it around his head, pinning the shell of each ear against his skull, and healed himself. His hearing returned with a rush, the ringing gone. 

“Leorio!”

He heard him groan. Kurapika ran to the sound and dropped at his knees as he found Leorio laid out on his back.

He seemed unchanged from before. He blinked, coughed, and pushed himself to sitting. His suit hadn’t even been singed--his glasses were in-tact, too. He patted himself down, his large hands and long fingers seeking any other injuries he’d sustained. They stopped over his breast pocket.

“How?” Kurapika asked. The answer came unbidden: “Hisoka.” He sat up on his knees and looked out at the wreckage. He saw nothing--no one. He heard no sound except the crackling of fire from where some stray siding had lit up. “Hisoka?”

Leorio winced as he slowly stood up again. Kurapika looked him over. “He’s not here,” Leorio said.

“What? But--”

Leorio held up a playing card. It had been left in the pocket of his suit.

Kurapika felt his eyes roar to red, fury pumping into his veins. 

It was the King of Hearts.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been asked a lot when I planned to write more Hisoillu and the truth is still, "Whenever I can." 
> 
> I was bit with a bug that had the best Leopika idea. I've never written them together before, because I couldn't quite place them together as a couple in a way that felt canon-compliant, and I really like writing things canon-compliant.
> 
> The bug was like, "Use Hisoka. He'll do it. Duh."
> 
> So we're continuing with our theme of, "Hisoka blows shit the fuck up for romance." At least it's an abandoned bunker this time and not an entire-ass cruise ship. Do you think that means he loves Kalluto or Kurapika more? Can we discuss his 10 favorite people? Kurapika's 7. Where's Gon? Illumi?
> 
> PS: I have another chapter of Shitsuji coming eventually, too. #SorryHisoilluFansIMTRYING
> 
> \--
> 
> I've bounced around the last few years, but you can follow me here:
> 
> Fandom and art: https://twitter.com/oakantony  
Writing: https://twitter.com/charlieamen (I've got some original stuff coming; check it out.)
> 
> And, uh, Tumblr: https://oakantony.tumblr.com/


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